ELECTRICITY. 121 



phial to it. As they move round, you see that scale draw nigher to the floor, 

 and 'lip more when it comes over the punch ; and, if that be placed at a proper 

 distance, the scale will snap, and discharge its fire into it. But if a needle be 

 stuck on the end of the punch, its point upward, the scale, instead of drawing 

 nigh to the punch and snapping, discharges its fire silently through the poin|, 

 and rises higher from the punch. Nay, even if the needle be placed upon the 

 floor near the punch, its point upward, the end of the punch, though so much 

 higher than the needle, will not attract the scale and receive its fire ; for the 

 nrcille will get it, and convey it away, before it comes nigh enough for the 

 punch to act. 



" Now, if electricity and lightning be the same, the conductor and scales 

 may represent electrified clouds. If a tube (conductor) of only ten feet long 

 will strike and discharge its fire on the punch at two or three inches distance, 

 and electrified cloud of perhaps ten thousand acres may strike and discharge 

 on the earth at a proportionally greater distance. The horizontal motion of the 

 scales over the floor may represent the motion of the clouds over the earth, and 

 the erect iron punch a hill or high building ; and then we see how electrified 

 clouds, passing over hills or high buildings at too great a height to strike, may 

 be attracted lower till within their striking distance. And, lastly, if a needle 

 fixed on the punch with its point upright, or even on the floor below the punch, 

 will draw the fire from the scale silently at a much greater than the striking 

 distance, and so prevent its descending toward the punch ; o-r if in its course 

 it would have come nigh enough to strike, yet, being first deprived of its fire, 

 it cannot, and the punch is thereby secured from the stroke : / say, if these 

 things are so, may not the knowledge of this power of points be of use to mankind 

 in preserving houses, churches, ships, <$fc.,from the stroke of lightning, by direct- 

 ing us to fix, on the highest parts of those edifices, upright rods of iron, made 

 sharp as a needle, and gilt to prevent rusting ; and, from the foot of those rods, 

 a wire down the outside of the building into the ground, or down round one of the 

 shrouds of a ship, and down her side till it reaches the water? Would not these 

 pointed rods probably draw the electrical fire silently out of a cloud before it came 

 nigh enough to strike, and thereby secure us from that most sudden and terrible 

 mischief? 



" To determine this question, whether the clouds that contain lightning 

 be electrified or not, I would propose an experiment to be tried, where it 

 may be done conveniently. On the top of some high tower or steeple, place a 

 kind of sentry-box, big enough to contain a man and an electrical stand. From 

 the middle of the stand let an iron rod rise, and pass, bending, out of the door, 

 and then upright twenty or thirty feet, pointed very sharp at the end. If the 

 electrical stand be kept clear and dry, a man standing on it, when such clouds 

 are passing low, might be electrified, and aflbrd sparks, the rod drawing fire to 

 him from a cloud. If any danger to the man be apprehended, let him stand 

 on the floor of his box, and now and then bring near to the rod the loop of a 

 wire that has one end fastened to the leads, he holding it by a wax handle ; so 

 the sparks, if the rpu is electrified, will strike from the rod to the wire, and not 

 afl'ect him."* 



When this and other papers by Franklin, illustrating similar views, were 

 sent to London, and read before the Royal Society, they are said to have been 

 considered so wild and absurd that they were received with laughter, and were 

 not considered worthy of so much notice as to be admitted to a place in the 

 " Philosophical Transactions."! They were, however, shown to Dr. Fother- 

 gill, who considered them of too much value to be thus stifled ; and he wrote a 



Letters, p. 235. t Franklin's works (memoirs), vol. L, p. 299. 



